LOVE FOR I

I tasted the air, the dry unseen particles that sweep through my flesh and blood, keeping it alive. My eyelids slowly peeled away, and my pupils observed my surroundings, vague and unidentifiable at first. I was on my bed, lying under the thin cotton covers, not having moved an inch from the night before. I moved. My icy feet, white from poor circulation, groaned as I forced them onto the carpet. Now sitting on the edge of my mattress, I slowly scanned my dark room, barely moving my rigid neck. Simple furniture: a dusty wooden desk with a matching chair, an old bookcase with tattered books. All used and old.

Gripping the cold mattress with my bony fingers, I whispered inaudibly, not today, not today. Today will be different. Not today. The silence watched, hiding behind the shadows of the dimly lit room. The carpet creaked as I shifted my weight onto my feet, and the silence held his breath. I stood.

At first, I did not feel it.

Then, even before I could release a breath of relief, it came. From the core of my beating beast, it exploded, sending waves throughout my nerves, my muscles, my senses. The hole, the small empty space that never healed, expanded, bigger and bigger; I had no control. Unable to control, unable to breathe, unable to think, I bowed down before it. Drops of sweat formed and fell, or was it the tears? Impossible to tell. How dare I try to forget, to try to change. The voices, the unavoidable voices, screamed at the top of their lungs.


Memories of her formed into a thick dark wall before my eyes.

I was a prisoner, a slave.

No escape.